Imagine a stereotypical family in a remote rural farm, doing their best to make a living and raise their children with the best values and education. Upon high school graduation, the parents struggle between encouraging their children to stay, keeping the family together and developing the farm, or encouraging them to “fly out” - go to best universities, find high-paying jobs etc. They soon realize that the only way to help their children succeed is to let them spread their wings as wide as possible, and earnestly hope that they will return someday.

While I assume many of us will resonate with this family’s decision, we sometimes see governments behaving differently in similar situations when it comes to their potentially high-impact startups: encourage them to stay (thus keeping jobs in the region), or encourage them to fly out as they aspire to be the global leader in their domain from their very first day of existence.

My advice to these governments: Let them Fly and help them go global, while strengthening the local cultural & social infrastructure, which will in turn strengthen the inherent emotional link between the entrepreneur and the region. The possibility of minor short-term job loss is fully offset by significantly higher medium and long-term employment generated by each successful startup.

This “Going Global” attitude is among the main reasons for the initial buildup of what is today a high density (~350) of Multi-National Corporations in Israel: either resulting from a startup acquisition, resulting from a global Israeli exec who decides to get back to Israel for social / emotional reasons, or otherwise.

This “Going Global / Help Them Succeed” attitude has probably inspired a few brave decisions (prone to populistic attacks by opposing government parties and/or by the press) of a few governments, e.g. the Landing Pad mechanism of the Australian government, the MassChallenge Israel (linking to Boston) endorsement by the Israeli Ministry of Economy and more.​Concluding, my advice to regional and national governments: Let them Fly. There is no alternative other than helping these startups succeed, and it will pay back.